Through my role at BARBRI, I help students every day prepare for success on the bar exam; however, when I personally began preparing for my second state bar exam (Georgia) this past February, I seriously questioned whether I was up for it—particularly given the demands on my time and my work responsibilities.

I invariably recalled the stressful and angst-ridden few months following graduation from law school when I marshalled every ounce of effort to pass the most important test of my professional career the first time.

As I began studying for the exam though, I realized that the skills, knowledge and grit that I had cultivated over the past few years impacted how I prepared for the exam.

5 ways in which I approached studying for my second bar exam differently:

1. I treated the bar exam like a client

Every minute matters. Most of us have learned how to maximize efficiency by putting every minute of available time to good use. Moreover, many of us are well practiced at juggling multiple client matters throughout the day, moving seamlessly from one task to the next.

I treated bar preparation like a client matter and decided how much time per day I could spend on it. I kept track of my time and moved on when I needed to work on something else. Where I could, I filled breaks in my day with some focused study. A half an hour of review during my lunch break or answering practice MBE questions on my mobile device while waiting for an appointment were great ways to maximize what limited time I had to devote to studying.

2. I obtained the right preparation resources

Of course I had access to BARBRI materials; however, I didn’t need the exact same materials that I needed my first time around. I wanted the right combination of the best study resources so that I could study the most efficiently.

These insights went directly into the development of the new BARBRI Attorney’s Course. This Attorney’s Course is all online and provides a streamlined study plan that allowed me to pinpoint my personal topic and subtopic weaknesses so I could spend time working on the areas that would most benefit MY personal exam score. This strategy was critical in maximizing my time while still putting me in the best position possible to be successful on the exam.

3. I maximized efficiency

To make the best and most efficient use of my limited study time, I had to determine which subjects deserved the most effort and prioritize my study accordingly. I found, like most of you likely will, that I had developed a very sophisticated understanding of a few areas and a better understanding of many additional areas of law since my first exam.

All subjects are not necessarily treated equally on the exam based on jurisdiction; therefore, I evaluated which subjects required a more in-depth review and prioritized those over other subjects that required (or deserved) less time. The benefit of the BARBRI Attorney’s Course is that we’ve already figured out that weighting for you.

For me, and I believe for most, familiarity with the subject and the amount of time I needed to dedicate to learning the rules in a subject dictated the best method of study, and it was a little different for each subject. Sometimes I relied more on the lectures during my daily commute and other times I really needed to review written materials.

4. I played to my strengths

The bar exam is a test of legal problem-solving. Sure, knowledge of the law is important, but well developed legal problem solving skills, strong reading comprehension skills, and sheer endurance will take a person very far on this exam.

As licensed attorneys, we have spent our professional career sharpening these skills and are adept at breaking down even the most complex of problems. Luckily, legal problems on the bar are much more straightforward and simple than what we encounter in practice.

In practice, I am accustomed to studying the law through the context of actual legal problems. Therefore, when preparing for the exam, I strengthened my knowledge of the rules by frequently working practice problems—both multiple choice and essay. I also made good use of the model answers to reinforce my knowledge of the black letter rules.

5. I kept the big picture in mind

Above all, I maintained my focus on the goal: passing the exam, which I did. The bar exam is a test of minimum competency. Expertise and specialized knowledge are not required for success. I had already passed the bar once and am already a licensed attorney. Sure, I may have had to learn some state-specific law or brush up on the common law majority rules, but mastery of every rule— or even every subject—was not necessary! I just needed to earn enough points to get a passing score.

If you find yourself contemplating another state bar exam, we at BARBRI wish you all the best and always know that BARBRI is here to help you Own The Bar….again.

About the BARBRI Attorney’s Course:

The BARBRI Attorney’s course builds upon your knowledge and skills to get you to your next law license, faster. This attorney-focused course saves you time by:

Providing a streamlined, all online experience constructed to save you precious, valuable time

Bypassing many basic bar exam test taking skills critical for first time takers

Getting you quickly to the most highly tested areas of the exam overall and within each subject

Pinpointing your topic and subtopic weaknesses so you can spend time working the areas of law that will most benefit your exam score.

Licensed attorneys studying for the exam in a state in which the Uniform Bar Exam (UBE) is administered or California may enroll in this course at this time.

In my job as a Director of Legal Education for BARBRI, I get the pleasure of working with thousands of law students each year.

My job, every day, is to help students achieve the dreams for which they have worked so hard by succeeding in law school and on the bar exam.

Recently, I spoke with some students who had received some misinformation as part of their bar preparation research, so it prompted me to put into writing “5 THINGS ALL GRADUATING LAW STUDENTS SHOULD KNOW ABOUT BARBRI”.

As the nation’s #1 bar review course, there are so many things to talk about so often some of these features are overlooked; however, with the bar exam being the only thing between you and the career of your dreams, we want to ensure you have all of the information so you can choose the very best partner for your needs on this life changing exam.

FACT 1: BARBRI does not charge extra to grade extra essays.

During bar study, your goal is to write the best bar exam essays possible, as fast as possible. BARBRI knows from experience that a purely “unlimited” essay grading system does not provide the best results. Think about it. Writing and submitting dozens of essays a week for grading simply reinforces bad habits rather than correcting them. Unlimited graded essays leads to spending a lot of time on many poor essays.

BARBRI has a better answer. It starts with Essay Architect, our exclusive powerful online platform that takes you through a series of steps to learn to critically read bar exam questions, enhance the speed of your essay writing and construct strong, winning answers. Then we assign a carefully selected series of specific essays for grading as well as many more essays for practice and self-grading.

And, if after all of that, you want additional essays graded, you can simply work with a BARBRI Director, like me, to get personal, 1:1 help, all free of charge!

FACT 2: You can do 100% of the BARBRI course online… but we won’t force you.

Actually, BARBRI Bar Review offers you the best possible learning experience by blending online, mobile and in-class study options. Each day you can choose whether to view the lectures on your computer, use the BARBRI Mobile App on-the-go or attend a bar review classroom location to watch a lecture in a structured environment with fellow students.

No matter which option you choose, you get the same great lectures. BARBRI lets you mix and match what works best for you – go to a classroom setting for your most challenging subjects, revisit specific topics and subtopics online afterward or speed through your best subjects online only at 1.5x speed.

It’s your time, your preference and your choice as to what works best for you to reinforce and recall the material you need to know to Own the Bar.

FACT 3: BARBRI is the only bar preparation course that will truly allow you to see where you sit on the bar exam curve

If you look at the MBE National Score Distribution from the National Conference of Bar Examiners, you will see the score distribution of the 2015 scaled scores. Results of the MBE fall in a pattern that look like a bell curve. This is why you often hear of people who fail the bar exam by just a few points. A large number of examinees are clustered right around the top of the curve – right around the score you need to pass the bar exam.

During the BARBRI course, you’ll have the chance to sit down and do a full simulated multistate bar exam. The simulated MBE has exam-like questions and we treat it just like the bar so you’ll know exactly how it feels to survive the multistate bar exam.

We also take your results and provide you your percentile ranking, by subject, so you know exactly where you are sitting on the curve in comparison to every other BARBRI student and where you need to focus your efforts between that time and the actual bar exam.

Since the vast majority of students sitting for the bar exam choose to partner with BARBRI, this will be your best predictor of bar exam success by far.

FACT 4: BARBRI makes it easy to take lecture notes by hand or on a laptop.

In order to provide the structure necessary to be organized as well as the flexibility that best fits your learning style, BARBRI provides lecture handouts in hardcopy AND as fillable PDF’s each day.

If you prefer to hand write your notes, then the pre-printed handout volume is there for you. If you prefer to use your laptop, download the fillable PDF’s so that you can type as much as you’d like for each blank, highlight text and use “sticky notes” for the occasional sidebar that you want to make a note of during class.

FACT 5: BARBRI’s Personal Study Plan organizes your study time from Day 1 straight through to the day of your bar exam.

The BARBRI lectures conclude two weeks prior to your exam but your Personal Study Plan does not. Once you’ve been taught all of the law that you need, your Personal Study Plan continues with homework, personal assignments, and practice exams to make sure that you are applying the law and memorizing the material during those critical final weeks and that you are focused on your personal areas of opportunity.

And, of course, my BARBRI Director of Legal Education peers and I will be there to support you right up to and during the exam. BARBRI’s study schedule and practice exams are the result of a dedicated academic team combined with the experience of training over 1.3M attorneys for the bar exam.

When it comes to your bar preparation and this critical decision, we want you to have all of the facts. Thousands of students have already chosen to prepare with BARBRI in 2017 – we can’t wait to welcome you to that group and help you Own the Bar.

About BARBRI Bar Review:

BARBRI pioneered bar exam preparation 50 years ago and our gold standard reputation continues to attract the overwhelming majority of law school students each year. BARBRI has helped more than 1.3 million students pass the bar – more than all other courses combined.

BARBRI focuses on you the entire way, using innovative new learning technologies that personalize your bar study. Add to all this our elite faculty of highly-respected law professors and top legal minds that know the law and especially how to teach it for you to Own The Bar.

Also, with the BARBRI Guarantee, if you take a BARBRI Bar Review course for the first time for a particular state and you do not sit for or do not pass that state’s bar exam, you may repeat the same course online once for the same state, the next time a course is offered, without paying additional tuition.

We have the longest history of pass rate success, going back 80-plus bar exams. No other bar prep program comes close.

Sponsored by the American Constitution Society for Law and Policy, the Gavel Gap website (gavelgap.org) gives the following description of the study:

In order to address [the] serious shortcoming [of lack of knowledge of state court judges] in our understanding of America’s courts, we have constructed an unprecedented database of state judicial biographies. This dataset—the State Bench Database–includes more than 10,000 current sitting judges on state courts of general jurisdiction in all 50 states. We use it to examine the gender, racial, and ethnic composition of state courts, which we then compare to that of the general population in each state. We find that courts are not representative of the people whom they serve. We call this disparity The Gavel Gap (emphasis added).

The Gavel Gap in my state, California, is unfortunately very pronounced. Overall, California was given a “D” grade. The state population is 31% women of color, 30% men of color, 19% white women, and 19% white men. However, the representation of each of these groups as judges in the state court is much lower. Women of color make up only 10% of state court judges and men of color are 17%, while 23% of state court judges are white women and a staggering 51% are white men.

As a woman of color, and person who generally cares about diversity and equity, especially in the court system, these statistics are disturbing. I think law schools can be better about encouraging people of color to aspire to the bench, and lawyers that are people of color need more models to look up to.

As an attorney who has taken and passed the Oregon bar exam as well as a UBE, I am excited to help guide students through this transition process. Below are some pertinent details you should know:

What is the UBE?

The UBE is a two-day exam, and it consists of the Multistate Bar Exam (MBE), the Multistate Essay Exam (MEE), and the Multistate Performance Test (MPT).

How is the exam changing?

Oregon has adopted the Uniform Bar Exam. This means that the Oregon Bar Exam will undergo several changes beginning July 2017. Oregon previously administered the MBE, MPT and a combination of MEE and Oregon-specific essays. With the first administration of the UBE, the essay portion of the Oregon Bar Exam will be replaced by the MEE. Here are the essential details:

Scores and Character Limits: Tentatively, the current cut score of 284 and the essay character limit remain unchanged. If adjustments are made to either or both, we will notify BARBRI students. UPDATE: The New OR Passing Score is 274.

Weighting: Previously, the Oregon Essay portion and MPT were weighted equally at 25%. The MEE will now make up 30% of a bar applicant’s exam score and the MPT portion 20%. There will be no change to the number of essays (6) or MPTs (2) on the exam.

Testable Subject Matter: The MEE will test Agency & Partnerships, Civil Procedure, Conflict of Laws, Constitutional Law, Contracts, Corporations, Criminal Law & Procedure, Decedent’s Estates/Wills, Evidence, Family Law, Real Property, Torts, Trusts and Estates, UCC Article II, and UCC Article IX. For those unfamiliar with the subjects currently tested on the Oregon Bar Exam, the two new subjects are Family Law and Conflict of Laws.

Score Transfers: Oregon will accept UBE score transfers beginning July 2017. Oregon will not accept scores earned in a UBE jurisdiction prior to July 2017.

BARBRI Bar Exam Digest: BARBRI compiles the latest bar exam format and requirements yearly from each state’s board of bar examiners and brings it together in this digest. Download this free resource here.

Why does this impact me?

The Uniform Bar Exam provides increased mobility for young lawyers, permitting lawyers to transfer scores obtained in one UBE jurisdiction to another, subject to certain limitations (for comprehensive information, please review the NCBE’s Bar Admission Guide, here). To that end, the Oregon Bar Exam will offer access to a larger job market by allowing successful exam takers to obtain a license in other jurisdictions, including nearby states like Washington, Idaho, and Montana.

With BARBRI At Your Side, You’ll Own The Bar. It’s important to know that no matter what changes are made to the exam, BARBRI is here to help you #OwnTheBar. We’re the only bar review provider that has prepared students for every single administration of the MBE, MPT, and MEE. We were here when the UBE was first offered, and we’ll be here for you now that Oregon has adopted the UBE. As the July 2017 Oregon Bar Exam approaches, we’ll keep you apprised of details as they become available.

It may seem way too early to write a post about this, but actually, it may be late.

I planned the spring schedule I thought I wanted during the summer, when I was signing up for fall classes. Well, to be honest, I planned the rest of law school to make sure that I would be fulfilling all of the requirements for my program and specialization, as well as taking the electives I want to take. I will personally be taking Civil Rights, Constitutional Criminal Procedure, and an Immigrant Rights Policy Clinic. I was going to take Professional Responsibility, but I may decide to work or volunteer at a local nonprofit or immigration firm instead. As I’m trying to solidify my schedule, here’s what some of my classmates have said about some of the classes they’re taking:

Advanced Legal Research: You don’t get a lot of opportunities to do research outside of the first-year required course, so this is a great way to supplement your legal education with practical skills.

Business Associations: Take it, even if you’re not interested in corporate law. First of all, it’s a bar class, and second, it’s useful knowledge.

Constitutional Criminal Procedure: Bar class. Definitely take it if you’re interested in criminal law. Focuses primarily on the Fourth and Fifth Amendments.

Evidence: Another bar class. Take Evidence if you want to be certified as a law student to appear in court. (Sidenote: one of my friends is certified now, as a 2L in the fall! In California, must have completed the first year of law school and taken Civil Procedure, in addition to completing or being enrolled in Evidence.)

Professional Responsibility: This is required, so definitely take it. When you take it doesn’t really matter, but be sure you take the right amount of credits for the state you want to practice in, because different states have different requirements.

What classes would you recommend 2Ls and 3Ls take? Let me know on Twitter @The2Llife!

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